Sustainability data helps companies assess climate risks, guide investments and support customers’ environmental goals. As AI expands how that information is used, data quality and governance become increasingly important to the decisions it informs.

Sustainability information spans departments and extends across suppliers and customers, complicating efforts to establish consistent governance. Knowing which source to trust is essential as AI makes information easier to access, according to Kristen Siemen (pictured, left), senior advisor at McKinsey & Company Inc.

“The data is critical, and having accurate data enables you to really understand where you’re at and really to put plans in place to take action,” she said. “Without having the data, it’s really difficult to even get started.”

Siemen and Jen Huffstetler (right), senior vice president, chief sustainability officer and global market access at HP Inc., spoke with theCUBE Research’s Krista Case and co-host Alison Kosik at Workiva’s Amplify event, during an exclusive interview on theCUBE, SiliconANGLE Media’s livestreaming studio. They discussed sustainability data governance, AI-assisted reporting and the controls needed to support business decisions. (* Disclosure below.)

Huffstetler brought HP’s perspective on managing sustainability data at a global scale, while Siemen offered an advisory view shaped by her work at McKinsey and her previous experience leading sustainability at General Motors.

Governance decides whether sustainability data can be trusted

HP sells in more than 180 countries, which multiplies the reporting formats it must satisfy. Customer requests for granular product detail arrive alongside regulatory filings and ranking questionnaires, making a consistent internal dataset important for accurate AI-assisted responses, Huffstetler noted.

“I will quote our [chief information officer] … ‘Enterprise standardized data, and that includes sustainability data, it becomes just the rocket fuel for a company that’s in transformation,’” she said. “If you’re looking at data across the company, sustainability data is no different.”

HP already faces requirements for limited assurance of sustainability data, according to Huffstetler. Both guests emphasized governance and controls while noting that reporting practices still differ across companies.

“If I think back to my time at General Motors, we ran the exact same processes for sustainability data and reporting that we did for financial,” Siemen said. “So, internally, our reviews, our assurance, the process and the sign-offs were all consistent.”

HP is also putting controlled sustainability data into customer-facing products. In June, the company fed data from its compliance intelligence platform into its Workforce Experience Platform, giving information technology decision-makers a dynamic carbon footprint for their PC fleets, Huffstetler explained.

“The other piece, I believe, in that human aspect is in the data quality and governance, really making sure that pipeline has clear traceability,” she said. “Transparency is becoming foundational for market access.”

Here’s the complete video interview, part of SiliconANGLE’s and theCUBE’s coverage of Workiva’s Amplify event:

(* Disclosure: TheCUBE is a paid media partner for Workiva’s Amplify event. Neither Workiva Inc., the sponsor of theCUBE’s event coverage, nor other sponsors have editorial control over content on theCUBE or SiliconANGLE.)

Photo: SiliconANGLE